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Monday, May 10, 2010

ANC Votes to Urge Community Uses at Vacant Parcels at Waterfront Station

At tonight's ANC 6D meeting, the Commissioners voted unanimously in a resolution to urge the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development (DMPED) to allow community use of the vacant NE parcel at Waterfront Station on a temporary basis until the site is ready to be redeveloped as a mixed-use residential development with ground floor retail. In addition, the ANC urges Waterfront Associates, the developer of Waterfront Station, to allow community use of their vacant NW parcel on a temporary basis. Below is the resolution that passed:

Whereas, Waterfront Station is now open and after nearly fifty years Fourth Street, SW is again the primary commercial corridor in the dynamic urban center of our neighborhood connecting both sides of Southwest and generating renewed pedestrian, bicycle and automobile traffic to and from the site and points north toward Pennsylvania Avenue, and

Whereas, the large parcel of vacant land located on the northeastern most section of Waterfront Station is currently in the real estate portfolio of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development (DMPED) and is slated to be built upon with residential housing and community serving retail in the Waterfront Station Second Stage PUD, and

Whereas, the Zoning Commission has already agreed to delay the completion of the First Stage Waterfront Station PUD for another two years, and Whereas, a Second Stage Waterfront Station PUD is unlikely to be actively developed until such time as the First Stage Waterfront Station PUD is completed and until the climate for residential real estate construction significantly improves, and

Whereas, the Southwest Community, although undergoing significant revitalization with the construction of the first stage of Waterfront Station containing three District agencies, a brand new Safeway, and 35,000 sq/ft of additional retail, the architecturally significant Arena Stage project and hundreds of units of both redeveloped and new housing stock, still lacks centrally located communal open space for our residents to meet, gather and recreate,

Therefore, be it resolved that ANC-6D, on May 10, 2010 at a regularly scheduled meeting by a vote of 7-0, supported the adaptive temporary re-use of the northeastern most parcel of land at Waterfront Station by the Southwest Community until such time as DMPED is ready to build the residential housing and community serving retail upon that parcel, as has been previously approved, and do hereby encourage DMPED to engage in discussions with the ANC in conjunction with Council member Wells’ office to ensure that the parcel may be productively utilized for, among other potential uses, a children's playground, a dog park and a community garden.

Be it further resolved that ANC-6D will request of the owners of Waterfront Station that the parcel of land that they control on the northwestern portion of that property, also slated to be developed as residential housing in the Second Stage PUD, be left as open space for picnicking and occasionally programmed for community special events until such time as it is built upon.

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